Jeremy Allaire, the CEO of Circle, revealed that his company is “exploring” a token for its stablecoin-focused Layer-1 blockchain, Arc Network. This announcement was made during a corporate event in Seoul, where Allaire discussed plans to use the token for governance purposes, incentives, and economic alignment while transitioning towards a proof-of-stake system.
Allaire expressed optimism about sharing more information soon on this development. This aligns with Circle’s strategy to transform Arc into a “distributed, community-driven system,” which includes expanding validator participation and setting up community governance frameworks. The possibility of a native token for the payments blockchain has been hinted at before, including during Circle’s Q4 2025 earnings call.
The CEO also mentioned hopes to advance Arc to its mainnet soon, aligning with Circle’s plans to launch a mainnet beta in 2026. Allaire highlighted collaborations with major financial and technology companies on the project, such as BlackRock, Visa, Goldman Sachs, and Amazon Web Services, who are partners on the Arc public testnet launched in October 2025.
Following this announcement, Circle’s shares (CRCL) have seen an approximate 10% increase for the day, trading recently above $108. The blockchain was introduced by USDC issuer Circle as an “Economic Operating System” that supports stablecoin-native applications, aiming to overcome existing blockchain limitations with features like deterministic finality, predictable fees in stablecoins, compliant privacy functions, and connections to other blockchains and traditional financial systems.
Circle is also preparing Arc for the potential threat of quantum computing by ensuring its mainnet includes post-quantum signature support. The company has released a roadmap targeting quantum resistance across wallets, validators, and infrastructure.